Serbia Targets Group in Assassination

ALEKSANDAR VASOVIC

Published 7:00 pm, Thursday, March 13, 2003

Associated Press Writer

The government accused allies of former President Slobodan Milosevic on Friday of working with underworld figures to assassinate Serbia's prime minister, as police hunted for gang members involved in the killing.

The police sweep, dubbed Operation Whirlwind, targeted members of the Zemun Clan, a shadowy crime network named after a Belgrade suburb, whose ranks included former paramilitaries loyal to Milosevic.

Investigations show that "a criminal clan, as well as some other groups, mainly police-security structures from Milosevic's times … were involved in organizing and carrying out" the assassination of Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic, the government said in a statement.

Djindjic, 50, was shot by a sniper Wednesday as he stepped out of his car in front of government headquarters in downtown Belgrade. He had been instrumental in ousting Milosevic in October 2000 and handing him over to the U.N. war crimes tribunal.

Officials speculate he was killed to prevent him from cracking down on organized crime or extraditing more former Milosevic allies to face trial in The Hague, Netherlands.

By Thursday afternoon, 56 suspects had been arrested, the government said.

Three members of the Zemun Clan agreed to testify against their colleagues in return for being named "protected witnesses," the statement said. "Their testimony confirms the participation of this criminal clan" in Djindjic's assassination, it said.

Police said Friday they had arrested "several" more suspects. They added that "nearly all European countries" are contributing to the manhunt for the assassins.

On Friday, masked policemen with machine guns surrounded a housing complex in Zemun belonging to one of the gang's leaders, Dusan Spasojevic. Two bulldozers started demolishing the buildings, crushing the large windows of a shopping mall and Spasojevic's private home, which has a swimming pool. There was no sign that anyone was inside.

Also detained Thursday were Milosevic's former state security chief, Jovica Stanisic, and his deputy, Franko Simatovic, who headed notorious Serb paramilitary units in the Bosnian and Croatian wars of the early 1990s.

Although long sidelined, the two are believed to have maintained significant influence among police and mob circles even after Milosevic's ouster.

Serbian authorities introduced a nationwide state of emergency following the assassination, giving police and the military a free hand to arrest suspects without warrants and detain anyone for up to 30 days without bringing charges.

The Zemun Clan ringleader, Milorad Lukovic, nicknamed Legija, succeeded Simatovic in 1997 as commander of the units that committed atrocities against civilians during the Balkan wars. Police said Lukovic went underground after Djindjic's killing.

Police also said three assassins were involved in shooting Djindjic _ one armed with a sniper rifle and two with handguns. They fired from the second floor of a nearby building and then fled the scene on foot.

Acting Serbian Prime Minister Nebojsa Covic said "close ties were created during Milosevic's regime between crime figures, war criminals and war profiteers" and that they likely joined forces to prevent Djindjic's efforts to crack down on crime and bring war crimes suspects to justice.

Djindjic had made enemies for his pro-Western stance, for handing the former president to the tribunal, and for declaring an open war on gangs involved in widespread smuggling of goods, cigarettes, drugs and women.

There were fears that the volatile Balkan country could plunge into violence in a possible power struggle for Djindjic's successor.

"Serbia cannot make up for this loss," Deputy Prime Minister Zarko Korac said at a government commemoration ceremony Friday.

Covic and four other Cabinet members are to be rotated as acting prime ministers until parliament elects a successor.

"Courage was the basic characteristic of our late prime minister, and that courage changed Serbia," a teary-eyed Korac said. "He was the source of optimism for all of us."